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http://www.alaskadispatch.com/article/russians-blame-us-militarys-alaska-haarp-array-mars-probe-failure
Doug O'Harra | Dec 14, 2011
Forget mind control, weather manipulation and the various other sinister capabilities ascribed to Alaska's High-frequency Active Auroral Research Program (HAARP) transmitter by the agitated, conspiracy-minded among us. A former Russian general has now apparently blamed the sometimes controversial radio facility outside Gakona for zapping that country's mission to snatch seven ounces of soil from the Martian moon Phobos.
The Phobos-Grunt probe was headed into space on Nov. 9 when a rocket failed to boost it into higher orbit, marking the 19th failed attempt by the Russians to mount a successful mission to the Red Planet. Its $163 million demise -- the probe is expected to crash to Earth in January -- triggered outrage in Russia, including a call for criminal prosecution by Russia President Dmitry Medvedev.
"The probe itself has since communicated only sporadically with ground stations, and even then it has murmured only unintelligible noise," notes Jim Nash, in this detailed post on Scientific American.
But Lt. Gen. Nikolay Rodionov, a former commander of Russia's ballistic missile systems, says covert U.S. radio beams -- not any Russian screw-ups -- scrubbed the interplanetary trip.
"In a November 24 interview with the Russian news agency Interfax, Rodionov said 'powerful American radar' in Alaska 'could have influenced the control systems of our interplanetary rover,'" Nash wrote in his post:
Rodionov was quoted saying the U.S. wants to use the ionosphere as part of its missile defense, although he did not elaborate. A subsequent article in India's The Hindu expanded on Rodionov's statement, indicating that he was likely referring to the U.S.'s (HAARP) observatory established in 1993.
As many Alaskans know, HAARP is a research facility on the Tok Cutoff northeast of Glennallen, used periodically by scientists from 14 different universities to tickle and analyze the ionosphere. A couple times a year, they power up its 180 antennas transmitters and beam radio energy skyward in various controlled experiments aimed at improving radio communication or researching the properties of the Earth’s near-space zones. See the HAARP FAQ for more.
HAARP last operated on Sept. 3 and wasn't turned on when the probe conked out, according to program director Craig Selcher, with the Air Force Research Laboratory, at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M.
Even if HAARP had been turned on, a full-power blast would have kissed the Phobos-Grunt rocket with about 1.03 milliwatts of radio energy per square centimeter -- about the same as pointing a 60-watt lightbulb at it from about 69 feet away, he told Nash.
Nash's detailed story has much more info and many great links. The Internet also lit up with this latest HAARP tidbit, perhaps exhibiting the facility's true power.
Contact Doug O'Harra at doug(at)alaskadispatch.com
Russia commemorates murdered journalists
http://english.ruvr.ru/2011/12/15/62252692.html
Dec 15, 2011 11:25 Moscow Time
December 15 in Russia is a commemoration day for journalists murdered for doing their job. On Thursday, dozens of people will lay flowers on the graves of the murdered journalists.
According to the Journalists’ Union, annually up to 20 reporters are killed in Russia. Some of the murdered reporters worked in hot spots but most of them were killed when performing their professional duties in peaceful time.
The Russian police have made progress in the investigation of several high-profile murders of the reporters.
Six suspects face accusations of the assassination of Anna Politkovskaya, a reporter of the Novaya Gazeta newspaper, who was murdered at the doorstep of her house in Moscow in 2006.
The suspect murderer of right activist Natalya Estimirova has been identified.
The court has brought verdict of guilty to the murderer of reporter Anstasia Baburova and his accomplice.
(RIAN)
100 Beluga whales trapped in Russian Far East
http://www.freemalaysiatoday.com/2011/12/15/100-beluga-whales-trapped-in-russian-far-east/
December 15, 2011
MOSCOW : Over 100 Beluga whales are trapped in water between ice floes in the Chukotka region of Russia’s Far East, the authorities said, calling on the government to send an ice-breaker to free them.
“A group of over 100 Beluga whales are cut off from the sea and are prisoners of ice floes in the Bering Sea,” the Chukotka region said in a statement on its website, saying the local governor Roman Kopin had requested an ice-breaker.
It said that the whales were trapped just 15 kilometres (10 miles) south of the village of Yanrakynot on the Bering Sea.
The statement said the Kopin had written a letter to Transport Minister Igor Levitin and Emergencies Minister Sergei Shoigu “to study the possibility of sending an ice-breaker to save the whales.”
It said that the whales risked becoming starved and the advance of the ice floes was reducing the space that they had to swim in.
“Given the lack of food and the speed at which the water is freezing, all the animals are threatened with exhaustion and death,” it added.
The Chukotka government said that the Russian ice-breaking tug Rubin was just two days sail time away and could bring help to the whales.
The Beluga whale is a protected species in Russia and it is one of a handful of wild animals whose cause has been championed by Russian Prime Minister and nature lover Vladimir Putin.
The Beluga even has a special page on the prime minister’s website (http://premier.gov.ru/patron/beluha/), an honour also accorded to the Amur tiger, polar bear and snow leopard.
In a widely publicised stunt in July 2009, Putin donned a wetsuit during a meeting with scientists on Russia’s Pacific coast and clipped a radio transmitter onto a Beluga whale named Dasha.
The whales can measure up to six metres and weigh two tonnes. They can stay submerged for 25 minutes before coming to the surface to breathe.
In Russia, they live in the freezing Arctic waters of the north of the Russian Far East as well as in the White Sea and Barents Sea in the northwest of Russia.
The page devoted to the whales on Putin’s website says that it is not clear how many Beluga whales live in the wild as scientific research into them only resumed in 2008.
Their habitats are threatened by the oil industry, global warming and hunting, according to ecologists.
Whales are often trapped in the Arctic ice but rarely in such numbers as in the incident off Chukotka.
Chukotka is Russia’s most northeasterly region, its population blighted by problems of alcoholism and social deprivation but boosted by support from billionaire Roman Abramovich, the Chelsea football club owner, who previously served several years as its governor.
-AFP
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